In a typical camera, light enters through an opening (aperture) at one end of the camera and is directed to a focal plane by a lens stack. The lens stack creates an optical channel that forms an image of a scene upon the focal plane. The focal plane includes an array of light sensitive pixels, which are part of a sensor that generates signals upon receiving light via the optical element. Commonly used sensors include CCD (charge-coupled device) sensors and CMOS (complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor) sensors.
Traditional cameras typically use a single focal plane to capture single images, one at a time. The image data from each pixel of the focal plane is then sent directly from the focal plane to a processor. The processor can manipulate the image data, such as to encode the image data, store the image data, forward the image data or modify the image data. In many instances, a standard interface is utilized between the focal plane and processor, which specifies the format in which data is transmitted between the focal plane and the processor.
The Mobile Industry Processor Interface Alliance (MIPI) is a non-profit corporation that has promulgated interface specifications for consistency to promote reuse and compatibility in mobile devices. MIPI has created the Camera Serial Interface 2 (c) interface format (MIPI interface format) for an interface between a camera and a processor.